The husband and wife team of Dr Saurabh and Pooja Lama have taken the reins from long-time Wingham Dental Care chief Dr John Stockard.

Pooja and Saurabh have already settled into life in the Manning Valley and breathed new life into the Isabella Street practice last week.

Saurabh is trained as a dentist but is yet to receive his accrediation from the Australian Dental Council.

Pooja and Saurabh are just an example of the expanding international medical presence in Wingham, which also includes visiting European vets Tom Gray and Lobke Buhrmann and Wingham Family Health Centre doctors Sini Joseph, Faiz Rasool and Thaya Yogathasan.

Pooja and Saurabh hail from the foothills of the Himalayas near the Indo-Pakistani border. Their home is the Punjab region. Punjab is a unique cultural region that straddles the border between Pakistan and India.

The total cpopulation of Punjab is approximately 110 million.

Pooja and Saurabh studied dentistry in the holy city of Amritsar, which is right on the Indo-Pakistani border.

Saurabh, a third generation dentist, joined his father’s practice in the city of Jalandhar upon completing his studies. Pooja also joined the practice after the couple were married in 1999.

After a few years working in India, the pair decided to try another country.

The couple moved to Sydney in 2006, where they spent nine months working in the city. Pooja then landed a public health job in Taree, resulting in the family’s move to the Manning Valley.

“At first we were reluctant to move to Taree,” Pooja admits. “The impression we had of rural Australia is that there is not much in between the main cities. I had visions of us living in the bush with no schools or anyone around us for miles and miles.”

But the couple soon fell in love with the country way of life.

“Wingham is a nice little town,” Saurabh said. “The country gives us a chance to spend time with our children, which is something we would not have been able to do to such an extent in Sydney.”